Don’t bar former employees who have sued the company from applying and being hired for new jobs. Doing so almost certainly invites a retaliation lawsuit—one that courts are likely to find in favor of the former employee.

You know it’s illegal to retaliate against an employee who has engaged in so-called “protected activity,” such as filing a discrimination complaint. Now the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals has taken the concept one step further ...

Beware: When it comes to judging Title VII and retaliation claims, courts may treat as employees many of the individuals you consider independent contractors. That’s true even if they are licensed professionals—such as physicians—working at your facility ...

Retaliation can turn a relative molehill of a discrimination complaint into a mountain of legal trouble. And the retaliation doesn’t have to take the form of something dramatic, such as a firing or demotion. Little things supervisors do can add up to retaliation. But supervisors can’t retaliate if they don’t know about earlier discrimination complaints or pending lawsuits ...

The EEOC has filed a second lawsuit against Albertson’s, the Idaho-based grocery store chain, for retaliating against workers in its Aurora distribution center. The first lawsuit, filed in 2006, claimed the center harbored a racially hostile environment against blacks and Hispanics ...

Q. We know that it is unlawful to discriminate against employees on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sex, age and disability. Do any other protected classifications exist under Texas law that might limit an employer’s right to terminate a worker employed at will? ...

You know it’s illegal to retaliate against an employee who has engaged in so-called “protected activity,” such as filing a discrimination complaint internally or with the EEOC. Now, the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals, which covers Ohio employers, has taken the concept one step further ...

HR is usually the first to know when an employee files an ERISA complaint or lawsuit. Since HR also typically handles transfer, hiring and promotion paperwork, that can put the company at risk for a retaliation lawsuit ...

Perrysburg-based Renhill Staffing Services has agreed to pay more than $580,000 to settle an EEOC lawsuit alleging age and race discrimination. The lawsuit accused the recruitment and temporary services firm of failing to refer blacks and people over age 40 for job openings ...

The Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA) protects members of the armed forces by allowing them to return to their jobs when their service ends. But USERRA has limits, applying only to service members who actually were employees when they went to serve ...

Good news on the class action front. A federal court has refused to allow a lawsuit to go forward as a class action when it was clear that none of the employees named in the complaint had anything in common except that they worked for the same company ...

An employer often bends over backward when an employee says she’s been harassed. It feels compelled to treat the complaining employee with kid gloves to avoid possible retaliation charges. That may be a mistake, especially if the employee becomes disruptive and generally uncooperative ...`

Ordinarily, a consensual affair carried on outside the workplace, even between a supervisor and a subordinate, won’t mean liability for the employer if the supervisor never threatened or punished the subordinate at work. But once the affair is over, and management finds out about the relationship, it’s critical to make sure the subordinate isn’t unfairly punished ...

The events that lead to an EEOC charge are sometimes beyond a company’s control. Whatever your role in the events leading up to the complaint, how your company fares depends largely on how you respond. Don’t blow it—mistakes can be costly. Here are the steps you should follow if and when you receive an EEOC charge ...

What happens if management wants to fire or otherwise punish an employee for discriminatory reasons, and HR objects? Can an HR professional who is then fired for refusing to play ball proceed to file her own EEOC retaliation or protected-activity claim? ...